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In Actual Play

7/27/2001 unodiablo: Madison, WI - Gamers sought
Hey Forgers, Like the title says, I'm looking for 2 or 3 people to game with weekly, or every-other-week. I'm on Madison's west side, so you need transpo, and I…
In Actual Play
Participants: unodiablo.

7/26/2001 Ferry Bazelmans: Curiosity killed the freckled fritzhopper
I was wondering who out there has played Soap and what their experiences were. Ron wrote a very insightful review here that resulted in me making the winning mechanic optional…
In Actual Play
Participants: Ferry Bazelmans, james_west.

7/25/2001 Mytholder: Hideous abuse of the Forge denizens
Hi all, I'm not going to GenCon (awww) but some friends of mine are (yippee). I'm fairly sure they haven't prebooked into any games, and I know from my experiences…
In Actual Play
Participants: Mytholder, Jared A. Sorensen, Ron Edwards, joshua neff, Dav, unodiablo, Jason L Blair, Clinton R. Nixon, greyorm, Clay.

7/24/2001 jburneko: Help With A Reply
Hello, This is a bit of a personal matter and I'm not sure how "apropriate" bringing this to the public forum is but I'm affraid I'm at a bit of…
In Actual Play
Participants: jburneko, joshua neff, Zak Arntson, Ron Edwards, Jack Spencer Jr, Supplanter, james_west, gentrification, Damocles, Epoch, Peter, Knight, Ian O'Rourke.

7/24/2001 contracycle: story and plotting
Hi folks. Maybe this is a well-worn rut, but I'd like to throw it oiut and see if anyone can offer any advice. I have immense trouble with story design;…
In Actual Play
Participants: contracycle, Max Tangent, joshua neff, Ron Edwards, Gordon C. Landis, Clay, Blake Hutchins.

7/21/2001 GreatWolf: Little Fear in action
Last night I actually got to do some gaming! Woo-hoo! And it wasn't playtesting anything of my own. Instead, I ran Little Fears for part of my group (the rest…
In Actual Play
Participants: GreatWolf, joshua neff, Knight, Laura Bishop, Ron Edwards, trelliz, Balbinus, Epoch, Mike Holmes, Jason L Blair, Tyrant.

7/18/2001 jburneko: PC/NPC Emotional Bonding
Hello, Ron and I have been going back and forth about characters emotional motivations. In his last email he suggested I open up part of the discussion to the rest…
In Actual Play
Participants: jburneko, James Holloway, joshua neff, Paul Czege, Blake Hutchins, mikeryan, greyorm, Le Joueur, gentrification, John Wick, Cameron, Mike Holmes, GreatWolf, Emily Care, Knight, Uncle Dark, Mytholder, contracycle.

7/18/2001 Paul Czege: I think my girlfriend is a...simulationist
My girlfriend is playing in Scott's Sorcerer scenario, which had its second session on Monday. It's basically her first experience with roleplaying. She played Soap previously, but that's a GM-less…
In Actual Play
Participants: Paul Czege, Uncle Dark, Supplanter, GreatWolf, Ron Edwards, hardcoremoose.

7/11/2001 poppocabba: getting rid of a bad egg
how does one get rid of a player, who while being generally thought of as a nice guy, is way too enthusiastic, hyper, and abuses player knowledge. he is 35…
In Actual Play
Participants: poppocabba, Jack Spencer Jr, Ron Edwards, Damocles, Ben Morgan, james_west.

7/10/2001 Clinton R. Nixon: 7th Sea, character currency, and advancement systems
I'm currently playing in a 7th Sea game, and I've enjoyed it more than I thought I would, to be honest. The system is simple, and many things about it…
In Actual Play
Participants: Clinton R. Nixon, joshua neff, jburneko, Gordon C. Landis, John Wick, Jared A. Sorensen, Rod Anderson, Ron Edwards, greyorm, Laura Bishop.

7/10/2001 hardcoremoose: My First Soreceror Session
Well, my first Sorceror session is history, and I guess I have mixed feelings about it. I thought it started out interestingly enough. As the curtain came up on the…
In Actual Play
Participants: hardcoremoose, Dav, jburneko, Gordon C. Landis, Paul Czege, Clay, joshua neff, Ron Edwards.

7/7/2001 greyorm: Stupid Player Tricks
Here's a doozy I ran into tonight while running my game, and something that's been bothering for a while about this specific group: There's no protracted engagement with the campaign.…
In Actual Play
Participants: greyorm, james_west, Mytholder, Ron Edwards, Paul Czege, Damocles, Supplanter, Jack Spencer Jr, Uncle Dark, hardcoremoose, JSDiamond.

6/29/2001 poppocabba: campus gaming awareness
I am going to a campus with a combined enrollment of nearly 40,000, and yet only one rpg organization that is primarily focused on larps. so my question is how…
In Actual Play
Participants: poppocabba, james_west, Ron Edwards, Cameron, Knight.

6/27/2001 jburneko: Serial vs. Unified Campaign
I was just wondering how many of you played Serial style and how many of you play Unified Campaign style, which you prefer, why and how you most efectively used…
In Actual Play
Participants: jburneko, Dav, Mytholder, Peter, greyorm, Paul Czege, joshua neff, Le Joueur, Knight, Ron Edwards, Harri Tusa, George Pletz.

6/26/2001 jburneko: Going Against The Party Mentality
Here's a question for you that occured to me. How many of you have played in games where all the players aren't acting as the typical 'party?' That is all…
In Actual Play
Participants: jburneko, joshua neff, Ron Edwards, Mytholder, Gordon C. Landis, Paul Czege, Valamir, Cameron, John Wick.

6/25/2001 Zak Arntson: Dying Earth
None of our group has posted about this yet, and somebody's got to let the Forge know. I played Dying Earth with Clinton Nixon gming, and two other guys playing…
In Actual Play
Participants: Zak Arntson, Jared A. Sorensen, Mytholder, Clinton R. Nixon, james_west, Blake Hutchins.

6/22/2001 jburneko: How Do You Let A GM Down Lightly?
Hello All, I'm sort of dreading tomorrow. Tomorrow I'm supposed to play in a 7th Sea Game. This is a 7th Sea Game I've been playing in for a while…
In Actual Play
Participants: jburneko, Zak Arntson, greyorm, Ron Edwards, Jack Spencer Jr, Epoch.

6/22/2001 Paul Czege: a really great character creation experience
Hey everyone, On the "I'm terrified of my sorcerer" thread in the Sorcerer forum, James hit me with this: On a slightly different note, could you elaborate on the…
In Actual Play
Participants: Paul Czege, GreatWolf, joshua neff, james_west, hardcoremoose, Ron Edwards, Le Joueur.

6/21/2001 Zak Arntson: Why D&D will never leave Hack -n- Slash
Played D&D again tonight. Here's an observation. Using the search time concept, I believe that D&D will never become a good system for non-dungeon crawling (i.e., search for traps, get…
In Actual Play
Participants: Zak Arntson, Gordon C. Landis, hardcoremoose, jburneko, Peter, Ron Edwards, Ian O'Rourke, greyorm, Jared A. Sorensen.

6/17/2001 joshua neff: timing is everything
last night i ran my first game session in a while. it went well. good, but not great. but one thing i definitely need to work on is pacing. i'm…
In Actual Play
Participants: joshua neff, Dav, james_west, kwill, Ron Edwards, Peter, JSDiamond, jburneko, Mytholder, Epoch, Blake Hutchins, Uncle Dark, contracycle, Shpyder, Clinton R. Nixon.

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Subsequent Topics
In Actual Play

7/31/2001 james_west: My first sorceror session (sort of).
I ran a session Saturday the 28th that mostly used Sorceror rules and genre, although I threw in a whole bunch of other stylistic weirdness. For instance, scenes were rarely…
In Actual Play
Participants: james_west, Ron Edwards, Valamir, Paul Czege, Dav, hardcoremoose, Ferry Bazelmans, greyorm.

8/4/2001 Galfraxas: Hello/Question
Hello Everybody, I'm new to the forums here, and I just thought I'd see if I could get some advice out of my first post here. I'm starting a campaign…
In Actual Play
Participants: Galfraxas, james_west, Ian O'Rourke, Uncle Dark, Ron Edwards, Valamir, Damocles, Henry Fitch, Mike Holmes.

8/5/2001 Supplanter: Good Omens in Campaign Prep
Our ftf Amber group has decided we'll play Nobilis as our "off game" - those Wednesdays when the Amber GM can't make it. We had our first prep session last…
In Actual Play
Participants: Supplanter, Epoch.

8/7/2001 Emily Care: Narrative Sharing
In the discussion of PC/NPC bonding Le Jouer mentioned the possibiity of the GM sharing narrative power with the players in order to involve them more in interaction with NPC's.…
In Actual Play
Participants: Emily Care, Uncle Dark, lumpley, Meguey.

8/10/2001 Laura Bishop: Lexicon: words words words
So, I've seen the terms 'Simulationist' and 'Narrativism' used several times here at the Forge, with a basic understanding of these terms by those who used them. I've also seen…
In Actual Play
Participants: Laura Bishop, Mytholder, Ron Edwards, Uncle Dark.

8/13/2001 Mytholder: The joys of plot critical mass
I've been running a Blue Planet game for a few weeks now. The first few sessions were ok, if a bit stodgy. Lots of plot set-up and showing the players…
In Actual Play
Participants: Mytholder, Ian O'Rourke, Gordon C. Landis, Supplanter.

8/14/2001 joshua neff: slouching towards narrativism
As some of you know, I've been running a Mage narrative for about a month or so. I slimmed the rules down in order to make it more narrativist, &…
In Actual Play
Participants: joshua neff, jburneko, Paul Czege, Uncle Dark, Mike Holmes.

8/17/2001 Ron Edwards: About this forum
Hey everyone, "Actual Play" is supposed to be about exactly that. It's a forum for discussing what really happens during game sessions. The goal is to get practical. Anyone should…
In Actual Play
Participants: Ron Edwards, Clinton R. Nixon.

8/23/2001 peteramthor: My Little Fears games
I've been running Little Fears since I got it back from Origins a little while back. Thought I would share some of the action with everyone here. Its been rather…
In Actual Play
Participants: peteramthor, Ron Edwards.

8/31/2001 hardcoremoose: The Pool in Action (Or, How I Learned to love the Hose)
By popular demand, here's my account of The Pool, which I had the pleasure of playing this past Monday evening. My intent with this post is to facilitate some interesting…
In Actual Play
Participants: hardcoremoose, Ron Edwards, James V. West.

9/3/2001 Supplanter: Mechanics, Emotion and Amberway II
The strong version of "System Does Matter" is that a game's design must do more than not impede a desired play goal; it must support it with fostering mechanics. I…
In Actual Play
Participants: Supplanter, Ron Edwards, Mike Holmes, Mytholder, greyorm, Epoch, Knight, James Holloway, contracycle.

9/4/2001 FilthySuperman: Creating the Gamer, not the game.
This is the closest folder I could find for this. Well it's happened. Here I am, years of gaming experience.. member of the elite "Forge" group of heavyweight discussors (is…
In Actual Play
Participants: FilthySuperman, Zak Arntson, unodiablo, Laura Bishop, Paul Czege, trelliz, Ron Edwards, Marco, Mike Holmes, jburneko, joshua neff, james_west, Ian O'Rourke.

9/4/2001 jburneko: Taking It All Too Seriously or Curse You Ron Edwards
WARNING: This post is an uncensored dump of my personal feelings. Sarcasim and humor are used heavily and any 'blanket' statements I may make about play styles and individuals are…
In Actual Play
Participants: jburneko, Ron Edwards, Epoch, kwill, Mytholder, Blake Hutchins, Cameron, Ian O'Rourke, Emily Dresner, james_west, contracycle.

9/9/2001 Ron Edwards: InSpectre'd at last
Hey, I've been wanting to play this game for too damn long. I even got to watch others play it at GenCon (brilliantly, too). So, at long last, this past…
In Actual Play
Participants: Ron Edwards, Jared A. Sorensen, James V. West, hardcoremoose.

9/9/2001 James V. West: The Pool: the creator's first session
Hey all: Finally, at long last, I have played my own game. I knew when I wrote it I would enjoy playing it, but that's usually the case with designers,…
In Actual Play
Participants: James V. West, kwill, Blake Hutchins, Epoch.

9/10/2001 jburneko: Not Roleplaying vs Not Role Playing How I Like
Ron, said something that caught my attention in the "Taking It All Too Seriously Thread" I wanted to explore it a little and so I thought it deserved it's own…
In Actual Play
Participants: jburneko, Marco, james_west, Ian O'Rourke, TrizzlWizzl, Ron Edwards, Mike Holmes.

9/17/2001 Tor Erickson: SOAP! test-run
(note: I'm posting a few rules comments over in the Reviews Discussions forum, under the current SOAP! topic) Hello all, So I played SOAP tonight to get a feel for…
In Actual Play
Participants: Tor Erickson, Ferry Bazelmans, Ron Edwards.

9/17/2001 Zak Arntson: Inspectres w/ Clinton & Justin
Okay, just played Inspectres last night with Clinton (of the Forge) and Justin (2nd time playing an RPG ever, and he's good at it!) ... Setup: Character creation went smoothly,…
In Actual Play
Participants: Zak Arntson, Ron Edwards.

9/19/2001 jburneko: The Accidental Narrativist
Hello, It's been a while since I've posted anything with substance and anything I have posted has been rather short and curt. The reason being that my gaming experiences of…
In Actual Play
Participants: jburneko, lumpley, Paul Czege, Epoch, Ben Morgan, Ron Edwards, Le Joueur, unodiablo, Mike Holmes, Knight, joshua neff.

9/26/2001 Zak Arntson: Indie Gaming - Red Box D&D
Okay, so our Sunday Indie Gaming went a little odd this weekend. I had to step out while the gang played Chez Geek ... One of our players had never…
In Actual Play
Participants: Zak Arntson, Ben Morgan, J B Bell, Bankuei, Jared A. Sorensen, Clinton R. Nixon.

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